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SVN Solovelanet Global
D
o orcas attack humans? The answer is certainly
affirmative for captive animals. On the other
hand, there is no evidence that orcas attack humans
when they are in their habitat.
In captivity there have been several fatal attacks. In
2010 two distinct orcas, Keto and Tilikum, the for-
mer in Spain and the latter in Florida, attacked and
killed their trainers during a show before the terrified
eyes of hundreds of people.
That year, the first one to pay the price for his gre
-
at passion for animals was Alexis Martinez, the
29-year-old trainer of Keto, a male orca aged 15 at
the time of the accident. Alexis had been training
Keto for several years and the two of them got along
perfectly, but one day, during a show, Keto started
be-having in an odd way, and before its trainers rea
-
lized something was wrong, the animal. turned to its
trainer, took him and pushed him underwater where
Do orcas attack humans?
it tore him apart. After a while it came out with Alex-
is's battered body in its jaws. Three months later in
Florida, during a show at the Seaworld, the largest
water park in the world, the orca Tilikum who had
been working for years with its trainer Dawn Bran
-
cheau, began to behave abnormally and suddenly
pushed Dawn under water and did not allow her to
re-emerge. In this case too, the orca whacked the
woman's body.
In the case of Tilikum, the matter was more serious
and there was much controversy, because a few ye
-
ars earlier the animal had mauled a drunk man who
had intruded among the pools and fallen into the one
where Tilikum was, so the fact that the animal had no
inhibition about attacking humans was well known.
Despite being responsible for two deaths, the orca
continued to work until its own death in Jan-uary
2013 at the age of 36.
Dawn Brancheau uccisa dall'orca
Tilikum al Seaworld Park nel 2010
Alexis Martinez killed by killer whale Keto during a
show at Loro Parque in Tenerife in 2010
